Asia stocks hit 9-1/2-year high

SINGAPORE (Reuters): Asian shares scaled near-decade peak on Thursday, bolstered by a surge in global stocks to a record high on strong US corporate earnings, while investors awaited the Japanese and European central bank meetings for clues on their policy outlooks.

MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan added 0.15%, hovering near its highest level since December 2007.

Japan’s Nikkei gained 0.1%. Australian stocks rose 0.3% and South Korea’s KOSPI advanced 0.15%.

The MSCI World index rose for its tenth straight session on Thursday and set a record high for the sixth consecutive day, lifted by all-time closing highs on Wall Street on strong earnings reports. The yen was marginally stronger at 111.83 to the dollar early on Thursday.

The euro was up about 0.1% at $1.1528 early on Thursday, after scaling a 14-month high this week following seemingly hawkish comments by European Central Bank President Mario Draghi.

The dollar index , which tracks the greenback against a basket of trade-weighted peers, was steady at 94.762.

The Australian dollar revisited Wednesday’s two-year high early on Thursday, still heady from the minutes of the last Reserve Bank of Australia meeting, released Tuesday, which showed the central bank had turned more upbeat on the economic outlook.

Gold rose about 0.1% to $1,241.06 an ounce on Thursday.